Synthetic membrane oscillators

Electro-osmotic oscillation (first observed by Teorell [1]—[4] in a laboratory set-up devised to mimic nerve excitation) may likely represent a common source of oscillations in various natural or synthetic electrokinetic systems such as solid microporous filters, synthetic ion-exchange membranes or their biological counterparts. The original experimental set-up, which contained all essential elements to look for when the electro-osmotic oscillations are suspected in a natural system, is schematically as follows. 

The initial motivation for studying membrane oscillators was to understand biological processes [6-8]. Model synthetic systems have been constmcted that are simpler than the biological systems they were intended to mimic, and the goal has been to isolate key principles using pared down designs. As often occurs with model systems, however, synthetic membrane oscillators exhibit their own peculiar behaviors, leading to new lines of study. 

---